


A Hand to Hold

by the_dragongirl



Series: Hand to Heart [2]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Rebels, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Canonical Character Death, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, F/M, Family, M/M, Minor Character Death, Multi, OT3, Polyamory, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Threesome - F/F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-27
Updated: 2016-07-27
Packaged: 2018-07-27 02:18:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,586
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7599628
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_dragongirl/pseuds/the_dragongirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Numa brings her second soulmate home to meet her family. Kanan was not expecting Numa's family to be <em>clones</em>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Hand to Hold

**Author's Note:**

> For [blondennerdy](http://blondennerdy.tumblr.com/) on tumblr, who requested more Numa/Hera/Kanan soulmate AU for my [300 follower celebration ficlet giveaway](http://the-dragongirl.tumblr.com/tagged/300-follower-celebration). This one got a bit out of control so...hope you don't mind a fic instead of a ficlet?

In retrospect, she probably should have warned Kanan beforehand.

It is not, after all, as if she didn’t know what he used to be. Hera had told her about what Kanan had done to save her life on the _Forager_ , but even if she hadn’t, Numa remembered enough of what the Jedi who liberated Ryloth during the Clone Wars had felt like to recognize the same traits in him. Kanan may not like to discuss his past even with his soulmates, but the signs were obvious for anyone who knew him as well as they did (and for anyone who had Numa’s particular...advantages).

But it honestly hadn’t occurred to her to connect her nerras with the massacre of the Jedi. They had, after all, both defected by that point in the war, and had in fact been on the Ryloth when the Republic fell. She vaguely remembered them receiving a holocall from Uncle Cody, and having to stay with Hera for a few days while her nerras went to “take care of something.” Nerra Waxer had told her afterward that their brothers had found a kind of sickness in their heads, and he and Nerra Boil had gotten doctors to take it out before anything bad could happen. They had never spoken another word about it, though Uncle Cody had told her more many years later.

So she hadn’t ever made the connection, until a mission from Fulcrum brought them conveniently close to Ryloth, and she decided to take advantage of the opportunity to introduce her second soulmate to her family. Kanan had taken one look at her nerras where they stood waiting at the edge of the empty field that served as her village’s shuttleport, and panicked. He had drawn his blaster, shouting for Hera and Numa to run, to get back on the _Phantom_ and get out of here while he held them off. He had tried to shield Hera and her with his body, which Numa would have found insulting, had she not been able to see how he’d gone pale and ashy, and to feel the terror rolling off of him in waves.

It had taken Numa and Hera together almost ten minutes of frantic explanations to get him to stand down, and another twenty to talk him into moving this discussion to Numa’s childhood home, and stop making a scene in public. He had still looked badly shaken, but had followed them anyway.

Now Kanan was sitting in the other room, utterly silent. Boil had tried to engage him in stilted conversation at first, but that had only seemed to make the tension worse. Waxer had eventually coughed, and suggested that “you kids must be starving, coming straight here from a mission. Boil and I will just go prepare little something to eat, shall we?” Boil had seized on the opportunity to make a hasty exit, and Numa had quickly followed. When she’d left, Kanan had been squeezing Hera’s hand like a lifeline, and Hera had begun to murmur something in his ear, too low for Numa to hear.

Waxer sat down next to her at the kitchen table, while Boil placed a cup of hot shig in front of each of them. Waxer toyed with his cup for a moment, then sighed, and spoke.

“You didn’t tell us he was a Jedi, cyar’ika,” he said, while Boil sipped at his own shig.

“I’m guessing from his reaction that you never told him we’re clones either,” Boil muttered. Waxer frowned a little, but said nothing.

“I didn’t think I _needed_ to,” Numa replied, letting the familiar smell of herbs and the presence of her nerras sooth away some of the tension brought on by her soulmate’s distress. “I told him that you have both been with the Rebellion since the beginning. You are my family! He has to know that neither of you mean him, or Hera, or me, or anyone in the Rebellion harm.”

“Num’ika,” Waxer chided gently. “You know as well as we do that it doesn’t always work like that. He may know in his head that there’s no threat, but if his gut is telling him otherwise...well, all the Jedi were warriors. A warrior listens to their gut first, in battle. As you well know,” he said, poking her gently in the forehead for emphasis.

“And from the look of him, he can’t have been much more than a kid when the war ended,” Boil muttered. “The Jedi always put their shinies in the field much too young, for my taste.”

“Not that young,” Waxer pointed out. “We weren’t any older.”

“Yeah, and look how that turned out!” Boil growled. “You almost died, love, because none of us knew how to say no to a General who’d lost his kriffing mind. And besides, we were trained for war our whole lives. Those little Jedi commanders? They weren’t!”

Waxer reached out, and covered his husband’s gloved hand with his own. They exchanged a wordless look of understanding, and then Boil turned back to Numa.

“The point is, Num’ika, if that Jedi of yours was in the field when it all went to hell at the end, he has a good reason to react that way to seeing faces like ours, especially if he wasn’t expecting it.” Boil rubbed his thumb over the back of Waxer’s hand. “After all, not all brothers were as lucky as we were. There are still some who never broke free of the Empire, even now.”

“I...hadn’t realized,” Numa finally said, after a long pause. “I mean, I had always known that you and Uncle Cody had more brothers out there, but I hadn’t thought you could really be mistaken for each other. Especially not by someone who feels the Force. Your faces may look the same, but you are such different people…”

“We know, cyar’ika,” Waxer said, his expression soft and little wistful.

“And so does that boy of yours. Or he will, once he gets over the shock and starts thinking again,” Boil added. Then he smirked a little. “After all, he’s your soulmate! He can’t be that much of an idiot, if he’s matched to you and Hera.” Numa grinned in spite of herself.

“Now,” Boil continued. “You get back in there, and the three of you talk this out. We’ll be in here whenever you’re ready.”

“After all,” Waxer said, “we would still like to meet him properly. He’s your soulmate. That means he’s family.”

Numa rose, and gave each of her nerras a kiss on the cheek. “Thank you.”

Boil glared at her in mock-disapproval. “I said go, kid.”

Numa laughed softly at that, then turned and headed back down the hall.

 

* * *

 

When Numa reentered the main room, she found Kanan leaning against Hera’s shoulder. Some of that rigid terror had left his frame, but he was still far from composed. Hera had removed both of their gloves, and was running her fingertips over Kanan’s left palm in light, soothing circles. Without hesitation, Numa removed her own gloves and curled up against them on the floor, her head resting on Kanan’s knee, and her fingers tangling with Hera’s to rest over Kanan’s mark.

“I’m sorry, love,” she said quietly, not wanting to disturb whatever sense of equilibrium they’d managed to regain.

“No,” Kanan choked out. He stopped, swallowed, and continued. “No, it’s me that should be sorry. I should have been able to keep my head better than that. Should have known you wouldn’t lead us into a trap, even by accident. It’s just...they’re _clones_ , Numa.”

“Yes, they are,” Numa said softly. “They are founding members of the Rebellion, and respected members of the Ryloth cell. They are fathers and brothers and husbands and friends. They are the men who raised me since I was a little girl, and they are the only family I have left besides the two of you. And they are also clones.”

“No, I know that,” Kanan blurted out. “I know they aren’t...who I thought they were. Or, rather, they aren’t _what_ I thought they were. Or maybe they’re more than I thought; I don’t know. And...well, I guess I should have realized there were some of them out there that didn’t betray us. But, then I once thought it would be impossible for _any_ clone to betray us, and then they... It’s just...damn it all, I’ve never actually told _anyone_ this. Not ever.”

“You don’t actually have to tell us _now_ , love,” Hera said, running her free hand through Kanan’s hair.

Kanan laughed, though he sounded far more hysterical than amused. “No, I really think I do. I’ve been not telling you for far too long now.”

He took a deep breath and let it out, then caught the hands resting atop his and brought them to rest over his heart. Numa felt something in him let go, like a knot coming untied, or a drop of ink swirling and vanishing in a pool of clear water.

“You both know...what I was,” Kanan began haltingly. “Before the Empire, I mean. I was...pretty new to the field. On my first rotation out, in fact. I had been so worried that no Master would choose me, that I would miss the war altogether. And even being wounded in battle didn’t do a kriffing thing other than make me all the more eager to prove myself.” Kanan’s mouth twisted at the memory. “I was an idiot. But De...my Master didn’t think of me that way. She saw something in me, I guess. Something I didn’t see in myself.”

He closed his eyes, as though lost in the memory. “She was a great Jedi. A member of the Council, even. So many of the Jedi thought she was broken, after what had happened to her, but she wasn’t. She was weary from the fighting and all the pointless death, and she’d been hurt badly, but she was never broken. I was so Sith-damned proud to be chosen to fight at her side.

“And as for the clone troopers she commanded...I thought they were the best men in the GAR. They were so loyal, and brave, and damned good at their jobs. They treated me more like some kind of kid brother than a commanding officer, which drove me crazy at the time, but I knew they had my back. During that brief time I was in the field, they saved my life more than once. I thought they were my friends.”

Then Kanan opened his eyes, and looked right at Numa. “Do you know what actually happened, the day the Republic fell? Not just that the Jedi died, I mean, but _how_ they died?”

Silently, Numa shook her head.

“It was the clones, Numa. They turned on us. One minute, we were laughing and eating together in the aftermath of battle. The next minute, they were trying to kill us.”

Hera made a soft, horrified noise in the back of her throat, but Kanan pushed on. “My Master...I think she saw it coming. Or, at least, the Force gave her just a bit more warning than it gave me. She told me to run, that she would be right behind me. And, Force help me, I did. I ran, and when I looked back to see if she was following, I saw the clones I thought were my friends gun her down where she stood.”

At last, Kanan looked away. “I kept running after that, and for a long time, a couple of those clones kept hunting me. Even caught me, a time or two, and if I hadn’t had better friends than I probably deserve, they’d have killed me, or taken me to the Empire, and I’m honestly not sure which would have been worse.”

Kanan swallowed again, and bowed his head. “And that’s who I see when I look at them, love. I see the faces of the men who killed my Master, who was the closest thing _I_ ever had to a family. I see the men who hunted me like some kind of animal, and made sure I never stayed in one place for too long. I know it’s not fair, and I know it’s not right. But it’s the truth.”

Numa turned then, and, without dislodging her hand from Kanan’s, rose to her knees and placed a kiss on his forehead.

“What’s not right or fair, love, is that those things happened to you,” she said. “I can swear to you that my nerras weren’t involved, that they were here on Ryloth when your Master died, but that doesn’t make your pain any less real, or any less rightful. I can tell you I know that even the clones who did those things had no choice in the matter, but that won’t bring your Master back to you. She was your family, and she was taken from you. I know how much that hurts.”

“We both do,” Hera said, picking up the thread of Numa’s thoughts, as always. “We have both lost family to the Empire, Kanan. Nothing can make that right. But I can promise you that we will never leave you to bear that pain alone.”

“You are ours, love. Forever and always, even after the stars burn out,” Numa said, twisting her hand in Kanan’s to very deliberately brush their marks together.

Kanan shuddered at that contact, then gasped when Hera repeated the gesture. They rarely engaged in a three-way touch like this, and hardly ever outside the privacy of their shared quarters on the _Ghost_. But it seemed right to do it here, in this place, at this time. It wasn’t sexual (or rather, it wasn’t primarily sexual). It was a reminder, a very tangible representation of the bond that held between them. It was a reminder which they all sorely needed, after the shocks of the day.

Finally, when the feeling had ebbed from a roaring tide to a pleasant background ripple, Kanan straightened. Numa pulled away a little, and said, “We can try this another time, love. Why don’t we all head back to the ghost, and make an early night of it?”

“No,” Kanan said, surprising them all. “No, I...I want to meet them. Your nerras, I mean.”

“Kanan,” Hera said cautiously. “You really don’t have to. I’ve known Waxer and Boil almost my whole life. They’ll understand if you need some time to get used to the idea.”

“That may be, but…” Kanan paused, his expression thoughtful, like he was trying to work out a puzzle whose pieces had only just become clear. “Look, I never had a family that way you two did. The Jedi didn’t do things that way. But I know how important it is to the both of you. And if it’s important to you...well, that makes it pretty important to me too.”

Numa looked at him for a long moment, trying to feel the currents of Kanan’s emotions eddying around them. Then she smiled and rose to her feet, pulling Hera and Kanan up with her.

“In that case, you’d better come with me. We’ve left Nerra Boil alone for so long that he’s probably cooked up an entire feast in there. And family introductions always go better on a full stomach.” Numa grinned more widely, and began to pull them both down the hall. Hera and Kanan followed willingly behind her, hand in hand.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Cyar'ika (Mando'a): Sweetheart, darling  
> 'ika (Mando'a): A diminuitive suffix, for a childhood nickname or pet name  
> Shig (Mando'a): An herbal tisane native to Mandalore

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [A Hand to Hold [Podfic]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/9090121) by [the_dragongirl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_dragongirl/pseuds/the_dragongirl)




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